Tuesday, September 07, 2010

I've updated the foreign film pages to reflect some of our now known contenders: Iraq (Son of Babylon), The Netherlands (Tirza), Romania (If I Want to Whistle, I'll Whistle) and Taiwan (Monga) have all announced. South Korea has narrowed their list down to six films, though most suspect it'll be Lee Chang-Dong's Poetry in the end. Many countries have yet to announce but there's still time. We generally don't know the full list until sometime in October. And some of the submissions won't have even opened in their home countries yet. (Foreign language submissions have to have been released in their home countries between October 1st, 2009 through Sept 30th, 2010 to compete in this category for the 2010 film year.) UPDATE: if you're looking for the current race (2011) that's here.

Romania: if he wants to whistle, he'll whistle, okay?

Taiwan: if he wants to shoot, he'll shoot.

Many countries have yet to announce but there's still time. We generally don't know the full list until sometime in October. And some of the submissions won't have even opened in their home countries yet. (Foreign language submissions have to have been released in their home countries between October 1st, 2009 through Sept 30th, 2010 to be eligible in this category for the 2010 film year.)

So far in the competitive lineups we have two rough sets of twins: two dramas about young male criminals (Taiwan & Romania) and two journey films wherein an older person searches for their adult child with a young child helping them (Iran & The Netherlands). And yes, "Oscar already loves the Iran and Dutch entries sight unseen," he said sarcastically. This AMPAS branch just digs cross generational journeys. A lot. You know they do.

I wrote about the Taiwanese submission Monga very briefly over at Towleroad earlier this year because of some talk show incident wherein they asked the 20something leads, Mark Zhao and Ethan Ruan, to kiss. I can't imagine an American talk show asking Young Hollywood co-stars to kiss. Could you imagine the ruckus if the ladies from The View asked the Twilight boys to lip lock in order to get their trailer shown?

To quote Nomi Malone... "different places!"

Here are the popular boys singing "Tonight Tonight" from Monga (with clips from the movie). It appears to be the theme song though Wikipedia states differently saying that this cover of "Making Love Out of Nothing At All," the Air Supply classic, has that honor. ("!!!" and also "???")

I'll update more Oscar pages tomorrow. In the meantime, if you need more Oscar speculation check out All These Wonderful Things' list of documentary hopefuls.*

17 comments:

Sounds like South Korea hasn't gone with the Lee Chang-dong, opting instead for A Barefoot Dream, by the same director who helmed their 2008 submission. About a guy who starts a football team for kids in East Timor: (link) Sounds like they know what AMPAS wants to see...

Hmm while it's very probable that "The Strange Case of Angelica / Estranho Caso de Angélica" will in fact be the Portuguese submission, don't count on it just yet.

We also have a Saramago novel adaptation, "Embargo", which garnered excellent reviews from the critic, and Raoul Ruiz's "Mysteries of Lisbon / Mistérios de Lisboa" which will be playing in Toronto. And "The Smiles of Destiny / Os Sorrisos do Destino" by the excellent and respected director Fernando Lopes. And "Two Women / Duas Mulheres" from João Mário Grilo.

Of course that the fairly positive reviews that de Oliveira got in Cannes make him the frontrunner but only once, I think, did Portugal submit two Manoel de Oliveira's pictures in a row. And since Saramago died this year they may want to pay homage...

And "Embargo" has been described as something the Coen Bros. would do. So it's good (I'll leave the trailer if you're interested in checking it out - I think I've left it here before, but... here goes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=iv&annotation_id=annotation_466590&v=TMl7fawSUZQ).

Dimitra -- Greece always sends the winner of the Thessalonika festival. I believe Dogtooth was eligible last year but they sent Slaves in Their Bonds instead.

I believe that means Biloba will be their submission this year (thought the IMDB listing for this festival is very confusing and different than it was just last year in terms of "category competitions"

Having read the book TIRZA is based on (highly recommended, by the way, though I don't know if it's been translated to English), I can reveal that it's a lot more dark and twisted than your synopsis suggests. It's true that the journey to Namibia is the main event in the movie (the rest is apparently conveyed by flashbacks) whereas it was only the second half or so of the book, but it's definitely a bit less sedate and solemn than it looks.

I just hope the bitter, mordant humor survives the transition to the screen...

Brazil, Denmark, Germany, Mexico and Serbia have all announced their shortlists....Fatih Akin's "Soul Kitchen" and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarittu's "Biutiful" are out of the running already!

I'm so excited for the Japanese nominee, but not sure it can make the Top Nine...Looking forward to hearing China, India and Italy announce (I'm confident they will be "Aftershock", "Peepli Live" and "The Man Who Will Come"), as well as France and Russia, which are more of a mystery!

I'm keeping the Wikipedia page updated, but it's not as detailed as Nathaniel's page.